


Consorting

by blackcoffeeandteardrops



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, The X-Files Revival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 04:12:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11661375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackcoffeeandteardrops/pseuds/blackcoffeeandteardrops
Summary: The FBI might still have a rules regarding how their agents behave in hotel rooms, but that doesn't stop them from at least talking about it. AKA, Mulder and Scully get to act at least a little bit like the adults they are. Post Home Again. Essentially, my take on how they got one step closer to being together again.





	Consorting

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was born out of two separate tumblr prompts from alittlemisfit and intentonpeace from over in tumblrland. I hope you both don't mind that my brain decided to merge them into one. And if you do...well, I owe you another ficlet then. =P All kidding aside, it is such a joy to write for these two characters I love so much, and I hope that you all enjoy. Thanks for reading!

At just past eight a.m., Scully hadn’t expected it to be quite so hot. But as she raised her hand to knock on Mulder’s hotel room door, she paused to pull her shirt loose from the sheen of sweat she felt beading at the small of her back, and she fanned her face. She knocked, stepping back and waiting for him to answer, frowning when she had to knock again. It wasn’t like him to not be alert at the sound of company. She’d left from her room shortly before and had gotten halfway to the bakery down the block before realizing that perhaps walking there rather than asking him for the keys to their rental had been a mistake. “Mulder,” she called out, shifting her feet and tightly clutching the bag containing their breakfast in one hand while fanning herself with the other. 

The door opened, and a second later Mulder appeared, dressed only in a pair of sweats hanging loosely around his hips, his hair sticking up in every direction. He eyed her up and down before opening the door further and letting her in. “Sorry, Scully. I tossed and turned half the night. To be perfectly honest, I’m not entirely certain I slept until shortly before you knocked,” he said, pulling out a chair for her at the table that sat near the window of his room. He watched as she unpacked the bag she brought and rocked back on his heels, suddenly aware of the fact he was shirtless. The room felt sticky despite the air conditioner being on full blast, and he knew he’d need a shower if they were to move any further with their investigation. “I see you come bearing gifts,” he said, gesturing to the bacon, egg, and cheese bagel she’d pulled out of the bag for him. “Sorry, do you mind if I go clean up first?”

“Sure, but it’s me who needs to apologize,” she said, fishing the container with her breakfast out of the bag. “They were just starting to brew fresh coffee when I got there, but I knew you’d want to get started, so I didn’t want to wait. There’s a pot here, so I could call down to the desk and see if they could supply us with some if you’d like that.”

“Whatever you want is fine by me,” he said, pulling a coat hanger containing a dress shirt and another with a pair of pants from the alcove that served as a closet. He cocked his head in the direction of the bathroom and sighed. “I’ll just be a minute.”

Scully nodded, occupying herself with checking up on test results for one of the victims in their case while she heard the shower turn on. The results hadn’t come in yet, so she tossed her phone onto the table and ran a hand through her hair, slipping her feet out of her heels and resting them on the chair next to hers. She hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before either, and had been up late reading reports while trying to determine just what was happening, so she was nearly asleep when she felt the slightest tickle against her ankle. 

Her eyes fluttered open and she saw him again tapping her foot, so she quickly sat back up. “I must have dozed off for a minute,” she said, drinking in the sight of a freshly shaved Mulder who, despite still being in his hotel room, had already rolled up his sleeves. It was going to be a hot day. She opened the box containing her breakfast sandwich and tried not to think about how, had this trip occurred in the past--in the Before, as she sometimes called it--he’d have caught her feet before she moved them away and let them rest in his lap while they ate. Things were better between them now, having worked together again on several cases since rejoining the Bureau. Still, she couldn’t help but notice his relief when he realized they still held firm on the rule regarding consorting in hotel rooms between agents of the opposite sex. It wasn’t as if there would be any consorting these days anyhow, she thought. Since leaving the house they called home over a year before, they’d only done so a handful of times. One of which had been much more recent, a few weeks prior in a hotel room such as this. She’d lost her mother and she needed to work, and when they’d gotten back to the hotel that night, she told him she needed him. The air conditioner kicked on and she was met by a cool rush of air, and for that she was grateful. Her face felt flushed, and she knew it wasn’t entirely due to the heat. Scully glanced up at him over her breakfast bagel, wondering if he could sense at all the feelings currently coursing through her, and smiled at the smudge of shaving cream he’d missed on his cheek. 

“What?” he asked, hearing her laugh. She pointed to her cheek and he frowned. “What is it?”

She shook her head before reaching out to wipe the shaving cream off with her thumb. “You missed a spot.”

“Scully--” he said, catching her wrist before she could pull it away. He considered it for a second, feeling her pulse with his fingertips, but as soon as the thought entered his head he decided it was a bad idea and moved to rest Scully’s hand on the table instead. “Any of the results come back yet?” he asked, desperate to change the subject. 

“Not yet, no,” she replied, crossing her arms and settling back in her seat. “And judging by the fact you seem to have all your faculties intact after last night, I’d say my theory regarding poisoning may hold true,” she said. 

The town they were in had reported several male victims, all between the ages of thirty and sixty years of age, who had fallen prey to what some had described as a virus that caused them to flail about, tearing off their clothes and go essentially crazy before dying, several times in public places. Women were involved as well, although most of the time the women seemed to grow increasingly emotional--emotions Scully herself was admittedly trying to quell--and within a few days were apparently fine. Her idea had been that the town’s water supply had somehow been poisoned, or that somehow they had all contracted the same virus, although why the younger and older men and women hadn’t been affected she couldn’t say for certain. 

“You really think this is poisoning, Scully? You just let me take a shower in there. What if I somehow ingested some of the water? I could start tearing my clothes off any minute now, are you sure that won’t be a problem?” he asked, incredulous. He popped the last bite of his sandwich in his mouth, chewing it slowly as he watched her take in his appearance, regarding him with a clinical eye for once rather than a more personal one. “I’m fine. Promise. I can still do the tearing of the clothes though, if you want,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows, desperate to try and lighten the mood. She’d been down since Maggie’s passing, and he’d tried to take every chance to make her smile, even if it was at his expense. 

“You wouldn't likely have ingested enough water in your shower to have gotten sick, Mulder. And besides, if your theory somehow holds true, that little rendezvous of yours last night surely would have caused something more serious by now,” she replied. She placed their empty containers in the paper bag she brought them in and stood to throw them in the trash can. “Perhaps you should call her, Mulder. Or perhaps make another appearance at the bar and see if one of the other women is game for you to buy her a drink. If we have another sample from her glass, then we could--”

“I’m not doing that,” Mulder replied, his voice firm. He stood, adjusting his shirt sleeves, and shrugged. “You’ll have to work with what we’ve got. Do you want to go meet with the sheriff and see if he’s learned anything?”

She laughed, not yet sensing his change in demeanor. “Mulder, if you truly believe there’s a gang of succubus women roaming around this town, feeding off the desires of men, then I would like to get out of this place as soon as possible. You having a few drinks or a meal with one of them would buy us time, and potentially another sample to prove--”

“To prove what, Scully? That someone is poisoning these people?” he asked, carding a hand through his hair as he laced his shoes. “We could just as easily do that walking into any restaurant in this town, including that bakery you bought our breakfast from. Come on, I’m sure there’s coffee piping hot there by now.”

He was halfway to the door when she stopped him, firmly grasping his arm. “What’s going on? Two days ago when we got here, you were excited for this case. Now that we’re actually making some headway, I find your reluctance to investigate troubling,” she said, swallowing a gulp of cold air within the hotel room while she still could. She knew that outside, it was sweltering. He hadn’t moved, which she took as a good sign, but he wasn’t looking at her either. “Hey,” she said, squeezing his arm. “What’s going on? What are you thinking about?”

“This case,” he replied, though he knew that wouldn’t be enough. If they were going anywhere, he knew he’d have to get his thoughts out in the open. “I know my theory is off kilter, and honestly while I originally believed it was true, I doubt now that it holds any water. Pardon the pun,” he said, and it warmed his heart that the terrible joke had earned him a smile. “The truth, Scully, is that maybe I think your idea is right. Or maybe whatever is happening here is somewhere in between. But either way, I don’t want to stumble in a bar tonight, and hope some women finds me irresistible enough to ask me to buy her a drink. I don’t want to realize that she’s putting the moves on me and have to play along because if I don’t the case could be compromised, and honestly?” he said, pausing until he was sure she was looking at him. “I can’t keep kissing strangers and pretending that they’re you.”

Scully took a step away from him, startling as her hip bumped into the corner of the dresser. She rubbed a hand over the sore area and proceeded to shake her head. She glanced at the unmade bed, the suitcase open with clothes scattered about, the crumbs that littered the tabletop where they’d just had breakfast. Anything but him. The room seemed small, and she pulled at her shirt, willing herself to stay calm. “I don’t really think now is the time to discuss that. We’re on a case, which technically means we’re at work, so we should--”

“You’re right,” he interjected, not missing the way her eyebrows shot up in surprise. He reached out, tucking a tendril of hair behind her ear, letting his fingers brush against her cheek a few moments longer than he probably should. “I just wanted you to know. It’s the truth.”

They had been doing this game since they’d fallen back into each other’s orbit, toeing the line between togetherness and something else altogether. She knew, without asking, they’d inexplicably be tied together for life. They had a son living safe somewhere that was living proof of that even though neither of them could see him, but even without William as evidence of their connection, there was something that remained in the room between that was palpable even still. Months apart wouldn’t change that, and a part of her felt relieved. “Is that the only reason?” she said, glancing up at him through her lashes, suddenly feeling small. She hoped he’d catch her meaning. If they were to get anywhere in their relationship, to regain whatever ground had been lost, they had to talk. Still, such things were at times difficult. 

“Well, that and the fact she and the other women we’ve encountered might indeed be a roving band of succubi bent on the destruction of mankind,” he said, grinning as he watched her roll her eyes. “But hey, I didn’t have anyone invade my dreams last night, so I must be good, right?”

Scully sighed, but she couldn’t hide the smile playing on her lips. “Shut up, Mulder,” she said as she opened the door. “We’ve got work to do.”

“Scully, wait,” he said, lightly grasping her elbow as she crossed the threshold. He brushed the pad of his thumb against her sleeve, clearly trying to formulate words for what he was thinking but at a loss for just how to phrase it. “What we were discussing before...not the women out to possibly kill me after bringing me to--”

“I know what you meant,” she replied, flicking her gaze briefly to his lips before darting her tongue out to moisten her own. “For the record, if the roles were reversed, I wouldn’t want to go about consorting with anyone else either.’

“It was just a kiss, essentially unreciprocated by myself I might add, there was nothing untoward about it,” he replied. The amused smirk on her face was doing to things to him, and if they were to get anywhere close to solving the case, he knew they’d have to actually leave the hotel room. He cleared his throat, unable to stop himself from approaching the subject that had been on his mind since it had happened. “Although, speaking of consorting…”

“Mulder?” Scully asked, reaching up to brush a stray thread from his collar. A breeze kicked up outside, causing the temperature to blissfully drop a few degrees momentarily, but also causing the scent of his aftershave to waft in her direction. “If you have any desire whatsoever for that sort of thing to occur again, and I have a suspicion that you do, you’ll get in the car right now and drive us to the station so we can get back to work,” she said before stepping away from him and heading for the parking lot.

He stood cemented in place, watching as she glanced over her shoulder, clearly enjoying herself. It was the most carefree she’d been in days, and he wasn’t about to deny her whatever shred of happiness he could provide. He shut the door to the hotel room, ensuring it was locked before pressing the button to unlock the car, shoving his other hand into his pocket. “But you’re saying there’s a chance?”

Scully shook her head, a blush creeping up on her cheeks as she returned his stare across the hood of the car. She opened the passenger side door and laughed, feeling younger than she had in a long time. How many rental cars had they been in over the years, chatting about everything and nothing at all? “Get in and we’ll see,” she said, missing the look of shock that flashed across his face as she buckled herself in. It seemed only natural that driving through a small town in the middle of nowhere, working a case that didn’t exactly make sense, was as good a time as any to begin again. Their road had been full of gravel and more potholes than she cared to count, but they were back the car again, and that was what mattered.


End file.
